RBWords

     I spent many enjoyable years in university campus ministry.  The students, faculty, staff and others who were a part of the campus ministry community were a constant stimulus to stay on top of what was going on in the world, especially the world of faith.  Inevitably students would encounter a professor who was agnostic or atheistic and very articulate.  Secular/scientific "wisdom" would present classic arguments against faith - arguments which were demolished years and years ago, but which still hang around university environments and require responses.  ("Prove to me that there is a God!")  Religious obstacles would appear in the form of fundamentalist Christians who would say, "Catholics believe this or that.  Where is it in the Bible?"  The challenges faced by the community in Corinth, which St. Paul is addressing in the words quoted above, were much the same as those faced by students and anyone else whose faith is questioned by "the powers that be."

     For St. Paul, the issue was manifested in the way the Corinthians were lining up behind certain articulate individuals, thus dividing the community.  His division of the "opposition" into Jews and Greeks is more social than intellectual.  Both Jews and Greeks were interested in wisdom and signs!  St. Paul says that he is preaching something that transcends human wisdom or miracles.  (We should recall Jesus' own complaint about generations that demand signs before they will believe.)  He is preaching about Christ who is both the wisdom and foolishness of God!  Ultimately all of this comes down to an act of faith.  Can we believe that God exists, that God loves us, and that God became human to save us from ourselves?  Or do we accept secular wisdom that changes with each new intellectual or scientific claim?  All wisdom and science should point us toward God.  Any other direction is a recipe for getting lost.  AMEN